If "it is just a piece of cloth", then then no one should care if the players don't wear it.

But the real issue is that FIDE failed to live up to its promise to defend players' rights. FIDE should have delayed choosing a WWC host country until they received an acceptable bid. Delaying the WWC by a few months would be preferable to forcing professional chess players to choose between submitting to intolerance vs damaging their careers.